Monday, February 1, 2016

Graceful missionary moments;)

This week was a great week! This
week we really focused on working with members and strengthening our
relationships with them and I think it was a really great week!

Thanks for the Gloves and Super Hot Cheetos - Send more Cheetos!

Yes
Nxxxxxx had her baby and everything is just great!! the baby boy is
healthy and happy (and as is the momma!) so thank you for your prayers!

Curly Hair and Glasses!

This
week we went to try and find our potential Lxxxx two different times
because her phone isn't working. So we went to the other 1st Maya street
and we think we found her apartment! But yeah that was really scary
haha. We go into the apartment right after we pass all these kids probably just eating candy that they set on fire (right? haha). So we find her apartment and
get to her door but there is a door before her door so we ring the
doorbell and right after we ring the doorbell we hear some man just
screaming. Like mad screaming. yelling. mad raging. pretty scary
screaming. We couldn't tell if it was coming from where we were going or
if he was coming up the elevator or in the stairwell or in a different
apartment. We went into this little doorway (man this is really hard to
explain haha I should have taken a picture of the hallway) and we say a
little prayer together. Right after we finish saying the pray this
teenage kid comes and opens the door and we go into this different
hallway and we get to the door that we think is hers. There is still
scary screaming but we think it is from a different apartment. So we get
to the door that we think is hers and all in all she didn't answer or
it wasn't her apartment. So we left the cookies at her doorstep with a
little note and pretty much ran the heck out of there haha. We went
again to her house on Sunday
in the day time and it was better- not as scary. Still didn't answer
but WE WILL GET IN CONTACT AND TEACH HER THE LESSONS haha if it is the
will of the Lord of course. But we are doing all we can! :)

On Tuesday
we tried to go and teach Gxxxxxx the first lesson (she is the one that
speaks English and wants to help us with Russian) and we flat out asked
if we could practice teaching the lessons on her but she wanted to do
something else. So we told about our hometowns in Russian, ate some
cookies, testified like crazy while talking about home and then also
read and left her with a Liahona. I pray her heart will be opened! She
is so prepared!

Wednesday
we dropped by a member Lxxxxxxx who is such a sweetheart but she is
also really intimidating and incredibly confident. She is also gorgeous
and has 6 kids. But we had a really nice spiritual thought with her
about faith. The members here in Russia are just so awesome. They are so
incredibly strong. BUT they have this cute yellow house and a turtle
and a giant dog! and at the beginning of our meeting too she was talking
to her daughter Mxxxxx and Mxxxxx was asking if 4 plus 4 equaled 9 and Lxxxxxxx was like "what are you talking about 4 plus 4 equals nine?! you
learned that in the first class!" haha it was so funny to me but I think
i just liked it so much because I actually knew what was going on haha.
her daughters are so cute:)

Thursday
we met with a member Ixxxxx! She is such a sweet heart! She has this
bright red hair that she wears in pigtails all the time. We got to her
house and it is just tiny and very cramped! Her son is on a mission and is coming home in about 2 weeks!
she is so excited:) We sang a lot with her and looked through family
pictures:) so cute!

Friday
we met with our less active who really wants us to buy Tupperware! She
kept trying to get us to come to this meeting and I told her that we
couldn't but I don't think Sister Beach knew what was going on because I
kept declining and then Sister Beach was looking at the magazine and
kept saying "oh man I want all of this!" haha man it was funny. we are
like the good cop and bad cop sometimes hahahaha

Saturday
we met with sweet member Mxxxx and Branch President Pxxxxxxx (pres of branch)
and so we went with the Elders because no one has ever met with him and
well we were just a little nervous haha so we went to this stop and then
he came and picked us up in his car (yeah I know?!?! no one here has
cars) and then took us to his house. Yeah ok he is a millionaire.
Literally. His house is the nicest house I have ever been in. He is also
such a great guy. He showed us all his pictures of his trip to the
church historical sites which was fun and then we also had a cool lesson
on the sacrament. He is pretty sick. They still don't know what is
wrong and he doesn't want a lot of people to know but he is going
through a hard time. he then just bore his testimony and told us about
how the missionaries found him and how he knows that god is mindful of
him and I cried a bit in that lesson. He is awesome !

Sunday
I also felt the spirit so immensely when one of the less active young
men who has been trying to come back to church blessed the sacrament for
the first time:) it was so awesome. I feel like so much of our work
here is to help people return back to the fold and when they come back
it is just so awesome. I feel like I get to get a glimpse of how our
heavenly father feels for us:)

I love you all!!

my favorite scriptures this week were Alma 8:14-15 (I read this after last weeks incident with Lxxx)

and then this weekAlma 17 especially v 16.

I have a testimony of the truthfulness of this gospel and that God loves us!